Pests - green aphids and winter moth caterpillar

We use pesticides. I have been on a course, passed an exam, have a certificate and obey all relevant laws. We regret the need to spray, but we are a commercial orchard and our customers will not accept scabby and maggoty fruit, let alone pay a premium price for it to make up for the reduced yield.

We use an absolute minimum, well below the industry standard, so we don't get 100% control of anything, which I think is about right. We also encourage beneficial inects by maintaining hedgerows and wild areas which are completely unsprayed, which are rich in wild plants and animals. If you jusst have 2 or 3 trees for your own family in the back graden, you will probably prefer not to spray at all and allow a 'natural balance' of pests, predators and parasites to establish itself. This is fine for the backyard orchard, the apple is such a generous fruit that you will still probably have more than you need even if pests destroy 60% of the potential crop. However if you are going to sell the fruit, this won't do and you have to contro pests. Pest and disease problems are worse in larger orchards as the smell of the apples goes further and attracts pests in from further away.

Here are some green aphids and winter moth caterpillars. We can live with a few of these. Winter moths can be reduced by grease bands, but you have to be careful to avoid these cutting into the tree as it grows. In Britain a brand called Boltac is available from garden centres which are quite good, you apply them in September and remove in spring, they stop crawling pests but not flying pests. The winter moth adults crfeep up the tree in late autumn and lay their egs, the caterpillars hatch out at exactly the same time the leaves and blossom come, and they will eat both. A bad infestation will destroy all the blossom and most of the leaves. Insecticide applied just before blossom will kill most of them.

NEVER NEVER NEVER apply insecticide when blossom is open as this will harm beneficial insects like bees. One hit with combined insecticide and fungicide before blossom, another after and one more for the codling moth at a time indicated by the pheremone traps (I'll post on this later) is about right to get 90-95% pest and disease control.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• aphids
• greenfly
• ants
• apple
• pests
• pesticide
• winter
• moth
• caterpillar
• greaseband
• grease
• band
• boltac
• fruitwise
• stephen
• hayes

[rubycheer101]

hello my mom came home with this huge green moth and its dead now and its a green aphid can i get deseases from it???

[stephenhayesuk]

@rubycheer101 most unlikely. Biting mosquitoes can transmit diseases and so can fleas and ticks, but only if they bite you.

[DamonBKnox]

Stephen I was going to send a video response and ask you about this weird thing that was going on with my bartlett pear tree. black burned looking leaves. I looked up some pear diseases and there was a huge list on wikipedia. I wasnt going to go through them all. I think I did find it though. Fireblight. I havent looked at any info on it yet. Do you ever have this type of problem?

[stephenhayesuk]

I have no agricultural training or qualifications, just an enthusiastic amateur who learned through doing and reading. There are differences between pest and diseases in US and UK (although many are the same), I believe we have fireblight as well as silver leaf etc

I hesitate to offer specific advice on pests and diseases. Hopefully other tubers will add video responses and better resources. I just share some of my problems in case its helpful. More research and training is needed!

[DamonBKnox]

Have you ever heard of (Im sure you have) of putting little nylon stalkings on the fruit? Of course I have a small orchard. Anyway if you have, what are your thoughts on how effective it might be with apples, pears, peaches?

[stephenhayesuk]

Hi Damon

This can be helpful to prevent wasp and bird damage on fruit which is almost mature, but not against aphid and caterpillar.

A few aphids and caterpillars like this indicate that we are not over-applying pesticide. If you achieve 100% control you never know how much is overkill. Excessive pesticide use as well as the problems of cost and residues may also kill beneficial insects.

Its a tightrope. There are no entirely satisfactory solutions, more research is needed!

[WhiWooMan]

I thought the following might be of interest. "Great tits can reduce caterpillar damage in apple orchards" by Christel Mols and Marcel Visser, Journal of Applied Ecology 39, 888-899. Blue Tits may also have a role to play in keeping caterpillar numbers down here in UK orchards (esp if these are adjacent or near to native woodlands) and invariably occupy nest boxes it may well be worth doubling box density to 4/ha. Westcountry Woodland Gardens offer wildlife nest boxes at reasonable prices.

[mickyboy200768]

@DamonBKnox i agree with stephen that could be fire blight, which is caused by bacteria (erwinia amylovora), you have to act fast if you have this desease in your garden ,there is no point trying to save the tree if it is in an advanced stage (you must cut it and burn it as this desease is highly infectiouse) but if you catch it at early statge you just have to prune branches and all infected areas of the tree making sure not to spread the desease (desinfect your tools)

[DamonBKnox]

Thanks for the info.